The Secret Life of Prince Charming (11 page)

“Yep,” Frances Lee said.

“We could just mail it,” I said.

“You don’t
mail
a quest,” Frances Lee said.

“I’ll have to think about this,” I said. What I was thinking was, Mom would never allow it. No way would Mom ever allow this.

“Think about it and get back to me in twenty-four hours. I’ve always wanted to say that, ‘Get back to me in twenty-four hours.’ But actually, if we’re going to do this, I’ve got to make plans. I told my friend Juan I might be able to help him move cross-country, and I’ve got to tell him yes or no.”

“Okay,” I said.

“There’s only so many days of summer break.”

“I’m still trying to imagine giving the objects back,” I said. This wasn’t just an empty spot above the fireplace—this was looting your own father’s house. His
most prized possessions.

“Wait, how much stuff is there?” Frances Lee asked. “There isn’t, like, furniture or big shit, is there?”

“No. But I didn’t look in the whole house. Maybe there’s
more. I only saw five or six things. God, there could be a ton of stuff other places, I never thought of that. And these were the only things with names. How many more things don’t have names?”

“We can’t be responsible for his whole fucking life. We’ll just do the few things you found. The five or six. Unless someone lives in Arkansas, or something. Mom’ll get her painting, the cheese’ll get her statue.”

“How’ll we know who they belong to?”

“Mom’s known the guy forever. Do you have the names?”

“Yeah.”
Jane, age 12. Olivia Thornton. Elizabeth…Abigail Renfrew.
Abigail Renfrew!

“So, we’ll start there.”

“I’ve got to figure this out,” I said. What I’d have to figure out was what whopping lie I could tell to get away with this. I’d have to figure out if I could live with
all
the whopping lies I’d have to tell.

“Call me,” she said.

“Thank you, Frances Lee,” I said.

But she was already gone again.

My hands were shaking. I closed my phone and stared at it. I needed something, but I didn’t know what. Something to drink. Food. An answer. I opened my bedroom door. Sprout was standing there with her arms folded.

“Boy oh boy, are you in trouble,” she said.

Sprout followed me down the stairs and into the kitchen.

“Goddamnit, Sprout,” I said.

“And I thought you had a new boyfriend,” she said.

“Goddamnit, you know you’re not supposed to listen in,” I said.

“Good thing I did, is all I can say,” she said. “Trouble is a-brewing.” Gram’s words again. Sprout had plucked off her hat, and her hair was all fuzzy-static on top.

“Find me some Fritos or something, I need to think,” I said.

Sprout rummaged around in the cupboard, found those snack bags of chips that you need to eat three or four of to be sufficiently chip satisfied. “Here. And just so you know, you go anywhere with Frances Lee, I’m going too.”

“We’re not going anywhere,” I said.

Sprout just laughed.

“Mom would never let us,” I said.

“Mom would kill us. Dad would kill us. That just means we need a
plan
,” Sprout said. “A plan that involves shading the truth.”

“It seems so mean. Stealing from him. God,” I said. “I don’t know why I’m even considering this.”

“Why is it that nice people can be so stupid and blind?” Sprout said.

I glared at her. “I told you, let me think about this.” I tore open a dwarf-sized bag of chips with my teeth.

Sprout stopped, listened intently. “Ivar’s in the bathroom. Ivar!”

“Someone left the door open,” I said.

“Kleenex feast,” Sprout said. She rushed into the bathroom, and a moment later Ivar came tearing out of there. Ivar was an old dog, but he had sudden bursts of criminal behavior, like a senior citizen who suddenly decides to rob a bank. He jetted out
of the bathroom fast as a lightning bolt, with a flash of white Kleenex stolen from the garbage can clenched in his teeth. “Open up, Ivar. Open,” Sprout said. She’d caught up to him, had her hands around Ivar’s fierce little chin. Finally, reluctantly, he released his treasure.

“Gross,” Sprout said.

“Who forgot to shut the door?” I said. I knew who, and I was looking at her.

“Who forgot to tell me about Brie’s statue? It’s what a good sister would have done,” she said.

I didn’t say anything, just munched my chips. She was right, of course.

Grandma came home from the dollar store just before Mom was expected back from work.

“That Bernice Rawlings is a nutcase,” she said. Bernice Rawlings, our neighbor, was a librarian at the Nine Mile Falls library. If you went there and asked her for a book about race
relations, you’d somehow leave with
The Tormented Childhood of Marilyn Monroe.

“Did she take our mail again?”

“Worse. She was hauling our garbage cans into her garage. She’s got Old Timer’s disease, I just know it. My God, we almost wrestled. I nearly had to grab that swag of flesh under her arm before she stopped.” Grandma set her purse on the kitchen table with a clunk.

“What, no bags?” I said. “Use an oven mitt, for God’s sake, Sprout,” I said. She was surprising Mom by cooking dinner and I was supervising. This was usually my summer job, supervising Sprout, but I was guessing this would be my last year of it. I started the job when I was twelve.

“I’m not stupid. The oven’s not even on yet,” she said.

Grandma, I noticed, was sneaking out of the kitchen and hadn’t answered my question yet. “I thought you went to the dollar store,” I said.

She turned around, and her cheeks were flushed. Of course, she
had
just nearly wrestled Bernice Rawlings. “There was nothing of interest,” she said prissily.

“No figurines of praying dogs? No Fourth of July hats?”

“I was tempted to get the Bible on CD for the house—Thou shalt mind your own business, and all that.”

“Ooh, low blow,” Sprout said from the sink. She was filling a pot with water for spaghetti, her specialty. Of course, spaghetti is everyone’s specialty because it is pretty hard to mess up.

“Huh,” I said. “Interesting.” I remembered what Mom said, about secretive people having secrets. You don’t go to the dollar store without coming out with something, you just don’t. It’s not
exactly one of those places you go in and tell some salesgirl,
No thanks, I’m only looking.
At the least, you buy a pack of batteries and a picture frame.

Grandma’s sneaky back was already making a beeline out the door. I didn’t have time to think more about it, though, because right then Sprout lifted up the wrong end of the spaghetti package, the strands cascading and sliding out the hole in the bottom and onto the floor. We’d picked up the last of it just as Mom and Annie came in the front door.

“She asks for a no-foam cappuccino, which always pisses us off, because a
cappuccino
by its definition is espresso with
foam
!” I could hear Annie say. “You want no foam, then you want a cup of freaking coffee, okay? She wants it extra hot, and with one and a half packets of Equal, as if she’s going to know the difference between one and two, and then she says it’s too hot and wants it done again. Her life’s so miserable that she needs to come kick a barista? Get her little boost of four-ninety-five power? Control in a cup. Wearing this little freaking tennis outfit, too.”

“Man,” Mom said. But you could always tell when Mom wasn’t really listening, because it was like her voice had left the room. She poked her head in the kitchen. “Hi guys.”

“Last day of school surprise!” Sprout shouted. Steam was coming off the pot, and Sprout’s face was red and shiny from heat.

“Wonderful,” Mom said. “Wonderful kids.” She beamed, as if seeing our greatness for the first time. She gave us each a squeeze.

“You’re in a good mood,” I said.

“And why not? It’s the last day of school and my kids made dinner,” she said.

“Grandma went to the dollar store and didn’t buy anything,” Sprout said.

“She’s being so fiscally responsible these days,” Mom said. She sounded a little prissy too, just like Grandma.

Aunt Annie kicked off her shoes. “You never go to the dollar store and not buy anything,” Aunt Annie said. “Batteries, at the least.”

“That’s what I thought,” I said. “Remember when Grandma decided to start a business making hats?”

“And then she wanted to do that dog walking thing,” Annie said.

“That would have been cool.” Sprout said. She stirred with the old wooden spoon we’d had forever. It had burn marks all over it.

“Maybe she’s starting a new business. Selling stuff on eBay, or something,” I said. This would explain all her recent behavior. “Maybe she was at the dollar store looking for good stuff to sell for
three
dollars,” I said.

“She should sell some of the hundreds of balls of yarn she bought to make those hats,” Mom said.

“We’ve still got the flyers for the dog-walking business,” Annie said.

“She walked Tucker a few times,” Sprout said. “When Will Green was on vacation.”

“I just wish she’d get off the computer every now and then,” Annie said. “Give someone else a chance.”

“You just want to investigate Quentin Ferrill. Cheaper to do
it yourself,” Mom said. She tore off the end of the French bread and took a bite of it.

“No, I don’t,” Annie said. Which meant, yes, she did.

“Sprout, you’re cooking from now on. That smells fabulous.” Mom sat in a kitchen chair. She really was in a good mood.

“One and a half packages of Equal. God, what a bitch,” Aunt Annie said.